A Match Made at Christmas - Courtney Walsh Page 0,39

He looked down at her. “A lot can happen when two people are alone.”

Well, heck. She knew that was true.

She dared to meet his eyes. Bright and sparkling with promise, as always, and yet there was something different there too.

He didn’t look away, as if he hadn’t yet made his point.

“It didn’t work very well last night,” she said, thinking of how sad Peggy had seemed on their quiet walk home. She hadn’t said hardly a word, but she didn’t need to. Pru understood heartache. If Pru had to guess, she would say seeing Howie had stirred up all those old feelings in Peggy, and maybe she simply needed time to process them.

“It worked pretty good for us,” he said.

Her breath caught. Was he . . . flirting with her? About the kiss, which she’d thought they’d agreed to never speak of again? And if he was, she should be angry, but mostly she was just trying to keep herself from going weak in the knees.

“I have a good feeling about this,” Hayes said, as if his words had zero effect on her.

“Okay,” she said. “I’ll go get Howie.”

He nodded, still looking at her, still unnerving her. She loved him, and she almost didn’t care if he knew.

She took a step back. “See you in a minute.” She walked away, aware that he was watching her.

Not so discreetly, she turned around and confirmed her suspicion. He lifted a hand in a wave, then walked away.

This charade had lost its appeal. At any moment, she feared she would bubble over with the truth. The words raced around in her mind like a dog chasing its tail.

I love you, Hayes. I’ve always loved you. I was just too scared of losing you to tell you the truth.

She shoved the words aside.

It was the Christmas magic working overtime. The gentle covering of snow blanketing the cobblestone outside. The beautifully decorated trees sparkling all over the room. The smells of delicious food, brought in from several local restaurants, filling the air.

And her overactive imagination.

That’s all it was.

She found Howie chatting with a chef. When Pru walked up, she caught a snippet of their conversation about lobsters, which Howie seemed thoroughly engrossed in. When he noticed her, his grin widened.

“There’s the woman of the hour,” he said. “Love the tree, Pru. The whole vibe is spot-on. Is the big one covered in surfboards too?”

She smiled. “Thanks, Howie. And yes. I made tons of small surfboard ornaments. All hand painted. You don’t think it’s too bright?” She’d chosen to stick with summer colors for the replica tree, a perfect match of the twenty-foot tree on Main Street. She’d decorated each with hundreds of small pink, turquoise, orange, and green surfboards, each one a tiny work of art.

Nontraditional Christmas was just as fun as traditional Christmas, and Pru felt like her tree celebrated both.

“’Bout time we got some color around here,” he said. “Seems like everything is white these days.”

She smiled. “Hey, do you have a minute?”

“Sure thing.” He gave the chef a nod and followed Pru off into the crowd. She knew the plan. She passed by the coat check where a young kid named Tad was working. As she walked by, he handed her a coat, then gave her a nod. He’d done his part to earn that handsome tip Hayes had slipped him earlier in one of their turns around the room.

“Where are we going?” Howie asked as she led him through the crowd and up the stairs.

“You’ll see.”

“You know that chef was about to give me the secret recipe for his lobster rolls, Pru,” Howie said, trailing behind. “You interrupted what could’ve been a really important conversation.”

She didn’t bother to tell him the really important conversation was the one he’d have in a few minutes. Instead, she pressed on until she came to the door that led out to the rooftop. In the summer, it was a coveted wedding venue. In the winter, it was cold.

But it was also the only private spot in the museum she and Hayes could think of.

Howie chattered on as they made their way up the stairs. “Aren’t they going to introduce you as the artist of the year or something? Seems like maybe you should stick close to the action.”

“Not artist of the year,” she said. “Just designer of the talking tree.”

“But this is like, your coming out party. Didn’t you always want to be a society girl?”

She laughed. “Do you know me at all?”

She pushed the